


Keeping Up With the Bartons

by amonkeysue



Category: Item 47 (Marvel Short Film), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Banter, F/M, Friendship, Keeping Up With the Joneses AU, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:27:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23098585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amonkeysue/pseuds/amonkeysue
Summary: For some deeper investigation into concerning intel, SHIELD assigns Clint and Natasha undercover into suburbia. Being neighbors is a definite change of pace, but it helps to have such nice ones as Bennie and Claire. Their neighbors might start to be a little more curious than expected though and begin to suspect "Natalie" and "Francis."
Relationships: Bennie Pollack/Claire Weiss, Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 4
Kudos: 41





	1. Getting Domestic

**Author's Note:**

> I am very much in the camp of how the general plot behind "Keeping Up With the Joneses" (2016) was a fun and easily adaptable idea to play around with and could be a good successor to the spy AU gap left behind without as many "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" AUs. It seemed like a perfect fit for a Clintasha AU at least, and I debated around on neighbor ideas before remembering that there was already a sort of there, very easily adapted couple already in the MCU, and thus decided to take Bennie and Claire from "Item 47" and stick them in a neighborhood with a family!  
> This whole story could probably be taken as a pre-Avengers AU if you wanted, just with Bennie and Claire having gotten together and settled down and not being in New York.

It was time to move in and meet the neighbors.

As far as undercover missions went, Clint and Natasha knew they had an interesting one ahead of them. Maria herself had been unable to keep from smirking as she sent them off with a knowing, “Good luck in suburbia” from their final briefing on the mission before they left.

It was potentially true that blending into a suburban neighborhood could be one of their most challenging ops yet in a sense, but it was a chance they were willing to take. They had enough knowledge of spying ins and outs, they figured it couldn’t be too hard to take on some overly curious neighbors who inevitably thought they were something like spies unto themselves.

Their new neighborhood was part of textbook suburbia, complete with the occasional cul-de-sac and mismatched wooden fences of various heights and grains in between the earthen tone cookie cutter houses.

(“Kinda seems like something we’d see in a movie more than actually just being here, existing for normal life,” Clint had wryly commented in their initial briefing from satellite and street view photos.

“Both of your backgrounds just happen to run counter to that,” Maria had evenly replied.)

They each drove in with a car, a couple other SHIELD agents driving in their moving truck behind them. They had had limited house shopping time and could only think of so much within their assigned SHIELD budget, even after looking up house basics suggestions, but they had made it work so that they didn’t look suspiciously light on domestic possessions.

And Clint argued that he had picked up on some sort of interior design experience from one undercover mission years earlier, despite Natasha reminding him that it had been exceptionally short lived and that he hadn’t even properly done the homework for that role.

Their new house was in a conservative tan shade with green shutters and brown brick accents, standing two stories tall and accompanied by several large flowering bushes out front.

Natasha just hoped everything would go quickly enough that they wouldn’t have to worry about gardening those. They had looked a lot less flowery in the briefing photos of the house.

As they began to unload the truck multiple neighbors slowly made their way out to pretend to do lawn work in front of their respective houses.

“The right next door neighbor is watching through the blinds,” Clint leaned over to wryly comment to Natasha as they carried a couple boxes in behind the other SHIELD agents who were carefully navigating a tasteful couch through the front door.

She nodded, keeping the motion subtle out of habit rather than concern of anyone else paying too close of attention. “I’d wager that she’s been on a substantial work break since we rolled in.”

“I don’t think we look too much like a couple who just bought this house with a suspiciously large amount of cash at least,” he said with a chuckle. “Even if word may have gotten around about that bit though.”

“As it is, I suppose we can’t blame them for being curious.” She nodded towards the driveway. “We’re the new neighbors and we may have gone a little fancy for the cars. And you know how much people like to think about cars.”

“I love how easily abundant curiosity gets us an in.”

Natasha smiled. “There’s thinking like a spy.”

They set their respective boxes down on a kitchen counter before heading back to the moving truck.

Clint casually scanned the surrounding front yards as they walked out, looking as much like he could be noting the weather instead of the surrounding activity. 

One neighbor had apparently decided to actually go ahead and legitimately start on some lawn work beyond the barest motions while they were outside already, accompanied by the sounds of revving the lawn mower.

He chuckled, knowing he didn’t need to specifically point out the neighbor to Natasha based on the small smile she had after a glance in the same direction. “Still can’t decide if we should’ve gone for an earlier move in time.”

“Except it’s suburbia, no good way to slip under the radar here,” she teased.

“If no one brings us cookies in the next couple days I’m gonna be really disappointed,” he said with a playful frown after picking up another box.

Natasha smirked. “If we don’t get any cookies from the neighbors, I’ll make sure you get some.”

“Aww, Nat.” Grinning, he lightly bumped his elbow against hers as they walked back to the house. “You’re too nice to me.”

She lightheartedly rolled her eyes, unable to keep from breaking into an affectionate smile in his direction. “I like keeping you around.”

“You’re my favorite partner.”

She arched a brow at him. “I’m your only partner.”

“You know how I meant that.”

“And I’m allowed to comment on your verbiage.”

Just in front of the door, Clint leaned over to quickly kiss Natasha. Upon pulling back he wryly murmured, “Congrats to us on this whole apparent newlyweds moving into the neighborhood thing.”

“Always love when an op needs a photoshoot beforehand,” she quietly replied with a clear note of teasing in her voice.

He waited to reply until one of their assisting SHIELD agents stepped past them through the doorway. “I’m excited to see which ones Coulson elected to get printed.”

They soon answered part of that question while unpacking, working upstairs while a couple of their temporarily assigned SHIELD agents helped to unpack on the ground floor.

Natasha brightly smiled and held up a wooden 5x7 photo frame from the box. “Looks like Coulson picked a good one.”

Clint stepped over, immediately breaking into a smile of his own as he looked at the picture. “Aww, we look great.”

They were respectively in a wedding dress and tuxedo, facing each other and brightly smiling with their foreheads pressed together. Clint had an arm around her waist, his hand at the small of her back to rest just below the lace line of the dress.

Natasha set the frame down on the nightstand before reaching for Clint’s hand between them. “Not to sound sappy, but we’re bringing that back with us.”

He slightly squeezed her hand back. “Aww, Nat. I love our fake wedding picture too.”

“It’s a good substitute for the actual thing.” She shrugged with one shoulder. “And we could stand to have a bit of actual decoration at the apartment.”

With his free hand, Clint loosely gestured around them. “Honestly, I’m tempted to ask the logistics on taking some of this back with us when we’re done. I’ve definitely been picturing how some of these things would look in the farmhouse. Get something beyond ‘safehouse rustic.’”

“Not even a day in the suburbs and we’re getting domestic,” Natasha teased.

“Like a look into some other lifetime.” Despite the light note to his voice, Clint’s expression was thoughtful.

She ran her thumb along the back of his hand. “It’s a nice glance into a much calmer version of reality.” After a second she let go of his hand, angling back towards the box she had been unpacking. “But before that,” she pointedly said, “we have a whole house to arrange here, and that’s not a small amount of space.”

“Love you too,” Clint brightly said as he went back to his own box after ducking to press a quick kiss to her lips.

\--

With the house effectively set up, Clint and Natasha were all too comfortable to take some time to themselves as they settled in and were definitely enjoying the way they could relax into the couch cushions.

She knowingly smiled at him at the eventual sound of the doorbell, Clint almost immediately slipping off the couch in response. “It might not be cookies.”

He waved his hand back at her. “I know, but I’m ready to lightheartedly judge these neighbors if they’re not there.”

“Kindly,” Natasha reminded, “We need them to like us.”

Clint grinned back at her, the smile almost infectious. “It’s me we’re talking about here. You really think it’s gonna be a problem?”

She replied with a small laugh. “Best foot forward, Barton.”

He was all polite smile as he opened the door to a beaming brunette holding a plate of Oreos with both hands.

“Hello,” she brightly greeted, “I’m Claire Weiss-Pollack, your next door neighbor to the right and I just wanted to stop by and welcome you to the neighborhood!” She held the Oreo plate up slightly higher and smiled. “And I hope you wouldn’t mind some friendly welcome cookies? They’re the Double Stuf variety too.”

“Aww, we love those actually. And thanks for the thought, it’s always great to get welcomed somewhere with food.” Clint accepted the plate with one hand as Natasha walked up behind him.

Claire maintained her smile as Clint angled towards Natasha in the doorway and gave a little wave. “Hi, I’m Claire. One of your next door neighbors. And congratulations on moving in, everyone was curious to see who on earth ended up in this house after it went off the market so fast. I mean, I don’t think the for sale sign even went up.” Claire paused, blinking for a second to get herself back on track as she cleared her throat. “Anyway.”

So presumably word had gone around about the cash purchase, to some extent.

Natasha slipped into the doorway beside Clint, extending a hand for Claire to shake while offering an especially polite and friendly smile. “Hi, it’s really nice to meet you.” With her free hand she gestured between herself and Clint. “We’re the Bartons. Natalie and Francis.”

“Welcome to the neighborhood, I’m sure we’ll be glad to have you.” Claire brushed a section of hair behind her ear as she paused. “If you need anything, ah, I’m usually around. I work from home and the kids are gone for summer camp for a month, so...” Her voice turned slightly awkward as she trailed off and her shoulders sunk forward an inch, going back up as Natasha’s smile stayed.

“We’ll keep you in mind.” Natasha loosely gestured behind her through the doorframe. “Do you want to come in for a bit, move this from right on the doorstep? We’d definitely love to get to know you a bit better.”

“Ahh, thanks for offering, but I, uh, should be getting back to this project for now.” Claire casually laughed. “Just thought I’d come over and say hello on my work break, you know.”

Clint nodded, still maintaining a wholly polite smile of his own. “It’s nice to know that we’ve got such welcoming neighbors here.”

“Yep.” Claire enthusiastically nodded back. “So I’ll see you around, neighbors!” She waved as she stepped back on the front sidewalk.

Natasha waited to say anything more until they’d closed the front door. “Cookies on a legitimate plate and meeting the right neighbor. We’re off to a good start.”

“And,” Clint said while walking the Oreo plate over to the kitchen, setting it down on the island, “time to bring over our polite conversation piece in return once the husband’s home?”

“Better make sure we have our cover stories down,” Natasha teased while leaning forward on the island and snagging one of the Oreos. “Considering our relevant hobbies.”

Clint leaned in towards her with a smile. “If we didn’t know our covers by now we’d be terrible spies. And probably shouldn’t have gotten past all those mandatory briefings and even gotten field permissions.”

“Something like that,” she agreed with a matching smile.

He prompted a quick kiss before popping in two of the Oreos at once, attempting to smile with stuffed cheeks even as Natasha rolled her eyes at him.

\--

Natasha rang the doorbell to the Pollack house, adopting an enthusiastic smile at the first sound of the door opening.

“Hey,” Clint greeted with a grin beside her, drawing out the word as Claire finished opening the door and slightly lifting the gift box he held with both hands to draw her attention.

To her credit, she hid her surprise at their arrival and apparent gift well.

“We wanted to return your welcome to the neighborhood with a thank you for being our new neighbors,” Natasha explained, maintaining her enthusiastic smile as she spoke.

Claire appreciatively smiled back. “Thanks, that’s really sweet of you. Here.” She angled herself in the doorway and openly swept her arm in a motion to gesture them inside. “Come on in. And my husband actually got back from work just a little bit ago, so it’s a great time to meet him too.” Claire cleared her throat for a second before calling, “Bennie, hon, the new neighbors wanted to say hi!”

A dark-haired man stepped out from the nearby kitchen while Claire led Clint and Natasha into the living room and cast them a polite smile as he came over with his hand extended. “Ah, hi, Bennie Pollack.”

Natasha was the first to shake Bennie’s hand while Clint gently set the gift box down on the coffee table. “Natalie Barton.” She gestured over to Clint with her other hand. “And this is my husband.”  
He introduced himself while next shaking Bennie’s hand and giving an open smile. “Francis Barton.”

Bennie nodded. “Natalie and Francis. Good to know.” He pointed towards the couch behind them. “Uh, please, have a seat.”

They all settled down across from each other with their respective partners.

Clint only waited a moment before pushing the gift box over several inches towards Bennie and Claire. “We thought we’d reciprocate the cookies with a little neighborly gift and come say hello.”

“A welcoming gift when you’re the ones moving in?” Bennie amusedly asked while reaching over to pull the gift box towards him. “Looks like we might be the luckiest ones with you as neighbors.”

“We just hope you like it,” Natasha brightly said with a matching smile.

After Bennie opened the box Claire carefully pulled out a glass and metal vase filled with what looked to be a variety of small rocks and gemstones. The bottom metal part was gold and had a honeycomb design to it.

Clint nodded towards the vase. “The stuff inside is from all over the world through some of our travels.”

“It’s beautiful,” Claire said with a smile, slightly holding up the vase for better inspection before looking at Clint and Natasha. “You say you’ve traveled a lot then?”

“We’ve been a traveling writer and photographer team for our company,” Natasha explained.

Claire gently positioned the vase on the coffee table while Bennie set aside the packaging. “So what brings you from traveling the globe to settling down in the suburbs?”

Natasha exchanged a side smile with Clint as he squeezed her hand. “We wanted a break from the constantly going and going to settle down for a little while after we got married.”

“And this is a nice little area. Great scenery just a couple hours drive away, some interesting sounding eats and activities in town. Should be fun to explore,” Clint added on.

Bennie nodded. “Sounds like an interesting perspective for this area, and congratulations.”

Clint grinned. “Thanks, and I’d be happy to get a local’s scoop on some of it.”

“But first, by any chance can curious minds hear where the things in our vase are from?” Claire asked with a polite smile.

Natasha leaned forward to point to various rocks and gemstones. “These amethyst crystals are from a little place in Brazil by the Pau d’Arco area, the Petoskey rocks here are from Michigan, actually, this calcite came from a little girl in Iceland after we visited her dad’s shop…”


	2. Suburban

Bennie and Claire stepped back from the doorstep after walking and waving Clint and Natasha out.

“I like them,” she instantly said after closing the door.

“They moved fast, with a gift and the visit.”

She shrugged and reached for his hand. “Hon, are you saying there’s something wrong with being prepared to meet the neighbors and get friendly after moving in?”

“No, it just… it’s kind of a lot to begin with, don’t you think? Do we respond with more than whatever cookies we had on hand?”

Claire led them back into the living room and gave another shrug. “Do you really think they’re turning it into a competition? And you heard them. They’ve been kind of separated from, well, our sort of life and they’re just trying to be friendly. Maybe they genuinely don’t realize that bringing a gift to us after they move in is a little over the top.”

“Mmm, yeah, that’s true.” Bennie shrugged back. “And it is going to be a great conversation piece.” He slipped his hand out of Claire’s to grab the gift box packaging, carrying it over to their ‘recycling items dumping ground’ by the garage.

“We should invite them over for dinner in a few days.” After Bennie had put down the packaging she slipped both arms around his middle from behind. “If you think you can get off work early enough? I’d love to have an excuse to get more travel stories out of them.”

“I’ll talk to Jerry. Try for Thursday?” He angled his head to try to look at her as she leaned her head in against his shoulder. “Y’know, maybe we should revisit the idea of that cruise sometime here, get some world experience of our own…”

A little laugh slipped out of Claire. “Yeah, maybe once the kids are in college though.”

\--

Dinner was a family favorite lasagna with a side (admittedly straight out of the bag) salad and their favorite lemonade mixture.

Clint and Natasha shared a hilarious story about encountering a particularly territorial sheep once in New Zealand before he casually rerouted the conversation.

“I don’t think we actually ever heard about what you do the other day, we spent so much time just talking about ourselves.”

Claire laughed. “That’s true.” She loosely gestured to herself before gesturing to Bennie. “I work as a virtual assistant for an indie video game company and Bennie works as a R&D engineer with Aurora Corp. They’re an aerospace and defense company, huge employers around the area.”

Natasha nodded. “Somehow we must have missed that.”

“And the company actually just launched a top of the line space debris collection satellite a couple months ago, really fascinating stuff.” Claire put a hand on Bennie’s knee under the table while looking over to smile right at him. “Bennie even helped to develop some of the harpoons they were trying out.”

“Space harpoons for space trash, huh?” Clint amusedly asked, a small grin spreading across his features.

Bennie gave a one-shouldered shrug, glancing down for a second. “It pitched well and tested well enough in trials for it to be approved.”

“Seems like you have a lot of fun work stories from all this.” Clint’s expression stayed entirely casual as he took another sip at his lemonade.

“Ah, well, kinda.” Bennie awkwardly laughed. “There were a lot of non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements that I had to agree to for the job, and I really like it to want to keep it. I can only talk a little about some of my projects and what part I have to play in them, let alone some other work stories.”

Clint deferentially held up both hands while Natasha knowingly nodded beside him. “Gotcha man. I understand how that goes.”

She shifted the focus back to Claire. “Your kids must love that you’re involved with video games.”

“Eh, I’ve tried to get them interested in our games but they’d much rather do whatever their friends are playing too right now.”

“Oh, really?” Natasha clicked her tongue. “That’s too bad.”

“There’s kids for you,” Bennie lightly remarked.

Natasha slightly arched a brow. “From what I hear.”

He couldn’t quite gauge if there was a dry note to her voice, but Clint said anything before either he or Claire could continue the conversation. “Oh, while I’m thinking about it, Nat and I were wondering if there was anything you could think of that we should know about this neighborhood barbeque thing.”

“Ohh, let’s see.” Claire thoughtfully paused for a moment. “If you’re not given a special assignment the general assumption is that you’ll bring a side dish, there will be plenty of lawn games, Susan and Bill three houses down usually open up their pool to everyone. There typically comes a point where most of the remaining kids get sent over there so the adults can do a little drinking and continued chatting without worrying about them being under foot.”

“And a lot of the neighborhood is probably going to at least want to say hello.”

“We figured as much with that,” Natasha said with a small smile.

“Oh, and Terri Culver always corners the side dish market for macaroni salad. No need to try and compete,” Claire quickly added on.

Clint chuckled. “Duly noted.” He shared a look with Natasha that apparently doubled as a seeming whole conversation. “How traditional do we have to stick to for summer barbeque potluck fare?”

“As long as something isn’t ridiculously spicy or too weird, I don’t think anyone would complain about a new type of food. We’re a lot of the same around here anyways.”

“We’ll see what we come up with then.” Natasha almost looked a little coy.

Claire brightly smiled back. “We could definitely use the variety.”

\--

Bennie and Claire had been asked to help set up for the barbeque, thus leaving time for Claire and several other neighborhood moms to get to chatting inside the open garage before and as everyone else started filtering over.

The soccer conversation was, as ever, a significant part.

“… she and Emilia are the stars of the team, it’s going to be a great season this year,” one mom bragged.

Terri – her famous macaroni salad already solidly positioned in the middle of the sides table – made a sudden thoughtful sound, her eyes widening a fraction. “No one look, but here comes that couple with the new house, right next to you Claire. The Bartons, right?”

She nodded. “Natalie and Francis.” Ignoring Terri’s request not to look, she slightly twisted around to see them walking up from a little ways down the street, Clint holding a 9 x 13 pan tucked under one arm and Natasha holding onto his free hand between them.

“They certainly dress like they’re young with money,” Terri wryly commented. “You’d never see any of us in a sundress like that.”

Claire frowned at her. “They’re very nice people, Terri.”

Terri warmly laughed and flapped a hand at Claire. “I’m sure they are! I just think she should be aware that this is a neighborhood party and that there are still children around.”

It was a small relief to see that Claire was not the only one casting Terri a disbelieving look. “It’s not a skimpy sundress, and even if it were, are we really going to shame her for a comfortable dress? Just because you wouldn’t be comfortable in it doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be.”

“I think it’s cute,” another mom piped up.

Terri huffed. “Well forgive me for being concerned for our children…”

“I think the kids can handle seeing another woman’s shoulders and knees,” the last soccer mom pointedly added on.

While Terri sputtered for a response, Claire seized the chance to excuse herself from the group and head over to greet Natasha and Clint as they reached the base of the driveway. “You made it!” she said with an open smile. “And the sides table is in the backyard by the deck, I can show you.”

Natasha matched the smile. “Thank you.”

“Then you’ll have to see about introducing us to more of our neighbors,” Clint lightly said.

Claire laughed. “I’ll see what we can do.” She turned and waved at the group of moms inside the garage, who all gave little waves back except for Terri. “Especially once everyone starts to eat, we’ve just been busy chatting up here.”

Clint chuckled. “Always good to start with food.”

After slipping past a couple children racing around the side of the house, he put the 9 x 13 of deviled eggs in a good spot on the sides table, waving up to Bennie as he greeted them from where he was helping to grill up some hot dogs.

“And,” Claire started to say after several others started gravitating towards the food tables, “I think there’s our start.” After waiting for a small group of kids to pass through the line, she led Clint and Natasha through the line, pausing in front of a container of small breaded spheres. “Now those look interesting,” she murmured.

Natasha broke into a knowing smile. “Looks like pampushki. They’re Russian.”

“Or Ukrainian,” Clint teased, casting Natasha a side smile.

She responded with a small eye roll, maintaining her smile. “No, they’re Russian. And I would know.”

While Clint chuckled Claire glanced between both of their faces. “So… are they good?”

“I would definitely try them,” Natasha said with a small nod.

“But if you don’t like them, don’t tell her. Russians can get protective over their country foods,” Clint told Claire with a lighthearted wink, following up with a small smirk to Natasha.

She gave another eye roll. “I promise not to be offended if you dislike them. Really.”

Claire was still a little cautious about trying the pampushki before making a sound of approval. “Not something I’d eat all the time and I think I’d have a hard time getting my kids on board, but they’re good. I just should make sure Bennie can try some of these.”

She snagged a few of the pampushki on a separate plate before sitting back down to finish up eating with Clint and Natasha, hopping up once Bennie was done on the grill.

“Terri’s been shooting you and the Bartons weird looks,” he commented in a whisper while accepting the plate from her.

“Yeah, she doesn’t approve of our new neighbors apparently.” Claire shrugged. “It’s Terri, what can you really expect?”

“I thought you were trying to be nicer about her.” The way Bennie followed up with a small eyebrow raise showed that there was a note of teasing as he spoke.

Claire innocently shrugged. “That was before I decided I really liked the Bartons and before she decided she doesn’t like them, especially Natalie. And I can always try again to be a better person about this, just later.”

He affectionately smiled at her. “Whatever you say.” After a second he poked at one of the pampushki. “Maybe I’m missing something obvious but am I supposed to know what these are?”

“Pampushki, apparently,” Claire immediately supplied, “They’re pretty good, Natalie recommended them after recognizing them on the table.”

“Ah, makes sense.” Bennie popped one up into his mouth, making an appreciative sound a second later. “Okay, I do like those. Thanks for saving me some.”

“Always, baby.” Claire smiled and leaned in to quickly kiss his cheek, resting a hand against his arm as she moved.

He munched on a couple more pampushki before gently nudging her side with his elbow. “Think we should warn Francis and Natalie about how competitive Kevin gets with darts over there?”

They had wandered over to where several other neighbors were gathered by a dart board, apparently looking to curiously involve themselves in the game.

Claire gave another shrug. “They’re already over there, not much to do about it now.” She took her hand off of Bennie’s arm after lightly squeezing it. “I’ll see what I can do though.”

Bill was the first up to throw and got a decent cluster within a half inch of the bullseye before retrieving his darts to several teasing comments and “Maybe next year, buddy.”

When no one jumped up to go next, Clint glanced around before holding up his hand. “Anything special if we do hit the bullseye here, before I go?”

Kevin nodded. “Twenty bucks and a beer.”

“Well that’s at least worth trying for,” Natasha lightly said, slipping her hand out of Clint’s after leaning up to whisper something in his ear with a small smile. It was difficult to tell if she looked more sly or amused about the situation.

He broadly smiled back at whatever she whispered before looking back to Kevin. “Anything more if you hit it with all three darts at once?”

Kevin laughed and whistled. “Getting brave, I see.” He paused for a second. “Tell you what, fifty bucks if you can hit it with all three.”

“Sounds like a deal.” Clint took the darts and stood at the prescribed rope line away from the target, holding them up together as he took a deep breath.

Claire almost missed the note of razor-sharp focus in his expression, something definitely intensely calculating in there and far more than she would have anticipated from a global traveler at a neighborhood barbeque.

Maybe he was just competitive. It wasn’t as though she and Bennie had ever fully understood that particular vein of thought to activities, and neither had any of the kids.

Almost blink and you miss it, Clint threw the darts towards the target.

All three solidly thunked together into the bullseye.

Clint grinned and innocently held both hands up at the audible surprised gasp and stunned silence he got. “Guess that’s not as hard as it looks.” He pulled the three darts out before dropping them into Kevin’s hand. “I think I’ll bow out from throwing any more while I’m on top.”

To his credit, Kevin hid his continued surprise well. “And as promised.” He fished out fifty dollars from his wallet before handing Clint a beer from his cooler. “Now who’s next?” he asked the group.

Several other people threw, one of them barely managing to hit the bullseye and everyone else ranging from close to almost embarrassingly off.

Clint and Natasha were trading off on sips of beer watching everyone else go, taking little comments from Claire about who was who, when Kevin brought over another three darts.

“If you’re feeling up to trying at all, Natalie.”

She set the beer down in Clint’s hand and paused for a moment, slightly eyeing the darts. “I’ll warn you that I wouldn’t expect anything quite as talented as Francis.”

“Of course not, but you might as well join the game. Best case scenario it’s an easy twenty bucks and beer, worst case scenario you’re no more embarrassed than everyone else after your husband.”

Natasha hesitated for a second before picking a dart from Kevin’s hand, holding it up as she spoke. “I’ll give one a try.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” Kevin gave a mock bow as she walked up to the line, holding her arm in a throwing position for a moment.

There it was again, the same intensive flash of focus that Claire had seen in Clint. Almost… tactical.

The dart hit the left side of the bullseye, earning a whistle from one of the other neighbors.

Kevin blinked. “Don’t tell me the Bartons secretly play darts all the time and you’ve set us up.”

An easy laugh slipped out of Natasha. “No, I haven’t tried this in years.”

“You should keep up with it, you’re damn good at it for being unexperienced,” another neighbor remarked.

“Just a lucky shot, boys. I’ll let you keep your beer,” Natasha breezily said as she stepped back, slightly smirking as Clint slipped an arm around her shoulders and leaned over to press a kiss to her nearest temple.

“Lucky indeed,” he grinned.

\--

Natasha and Clint had bowed out from the barbeque shortly after the darts game, citing a work call and politely wishing everyone a good rest of their evening.

Claire didn’t think any more of it until she and Bennie came back home just as Clint and Natasha were pulling out of their driveway.

“Wonder what they’re up to,” Bennie commented as he waved at them while they drove by.

“Were those leather jackets?” Claire asked with a curious frown. They had looked to be in black, with the addition of sunglasses on Clint and a ponytail on Natasha. “In this weather?”

“I didn’t get a good look at them.” Bennie unlocked the door, holding it open for Claire as she stepped through.

Claire took another glance back at the road, Clint and Natasha’s car well out of sight. “It seems a little… weird.”

“Hon.” He reached for both of her hands, standing in front of her. “It’s probably nothing, just something for work. Don’t overthink it,” he reassuringly said before leaning over for a quick kiss. “Otherwise you’re going to be in league with Terri.”

She frowned. “Being curious is different from judging them.”

Bennie sighed. “At least sleep on it rather than jumping to any conclusions.”

She didn’t argue, content to get ready for bed and curl up with the next few chapters of her book.

They both knew it was also just serving as an excuse for her to stay up until she heard the sounds of Clint and Natasha pulling back into their garage, but he let her get away with it.

Between the gentle in and out of Bennie’s breathing beside her and having gotten decidedly used to earlier bedtimes with the kids around, Claire was about ready to give up before she heard the quiet hum of the next door garage. (For some reason it had always been a little creakier than everyone else’s systems and they hadn’t bothered to say anything.)

A little past eleven.

Hmm.

Something beyond work had to be going on. It was definitely weird.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For simplicity, the narration from Bennie and Claire's perspective is going to stick with using Clint and Natasha as long as it's not a conversation, that's where the cover names are all that's known/used. The secret identity part is still perfectly safe, it's just a writing thing!


	3. Spies and Scuba

“D’ya think I have to join the ranks of Saturday yard work?” Clint tiredly murmured into Natasha’s shoulder as he hugged her to him.

“Or,” Natasha slowly began, “you could stick to the house and bring me breakfast in bed.” As she spoke she twisted around in his arms, resting one of her hands against his chest and purposefully looking up at him through her eyelashes. “That seems like a newlywed thing to do.”

Clint chuckled back. “Orders accepted, I’m going.”

Before he could fully pull away she followed him for a quick kiss on the lips, only to lightly push at his chest to prompt him to continue off the bed. “Remember that you’ve built expectations, Barton.”

“Do you want the post mission breakfast or the morning after breakfast?” he wryly asked while pulling on a t-shirt.

“Mmm, post mission.”

Cooking up some omelettes and prepping some oatmeal and sliced fruit didn’t take long, and Clint was quickly returning to Natasha’s side with the food and two large mugs of coffee.

She had started reviewing the security footage they had copied over the night before from Aurora Corp and put the tablet she was working from on Clint’s knee after he set the food in front of her.

“Someone’s been smart enough to doctor the footage,” she said before a sip of her coffee.

Clint had taken a gulp of his and took a second to swallow before replying. “What’s the timeframe for this?”

“Between five to six yesterday, I’m sure we can narrow it further as we look.”

“Hmm.” He tapped back and forth in the appropriate section of footage on the tablet. “That security booth isn’t too bad on their security, they’d definitely need an in with at least one of the guards to get in to doctor it.”

Natasha had started on her fruit. “Or get a guard to do it themselves.”

“Right.” Clint nodded. “I take it you’ve already sent this to the techs? And we’re hoping for some signs of sloppy doctoring?”

She nodded back. “Maria’s already confirmed that they got it and that we’re a priority. No estimate for completion time as of yet.” After another bite of fruit she tapped the footage backwards a ways. “We’d need to get an employee list to compare departments and schedules, but the broad timeframe would fit for these people.”

With a tap on another part of the screen, highlight boxes appeared on the footage over the people Natasha had earmarked.

Clint flicked through the best views available from the footage.

“If the techs don’t find something this is going to need some solid recon. Good thing we already have our in,” he amusedly commented after several moments studying the several partial views they had of people. 

“As long as Francis isn’t forgetting his wife,” Natasha pointedly teased.

“Aww, Nat.” Careful of the food, Clint leaned over for a brief kiss, simultaneously reaching up to hold the side of her face and brushing his thumb along her cheekbone. “You know I love that this mission inherently involves plenty of excuses for just you and me,” he murmured while pulling back.

“I wouldn’t complain about acting as domestic newlyweds again after this.”

Clint grinned. “I bet Coulson could figure another op out for us. We can bribe him with doughnuts.”

“You do know he’s not in love with them, right? He just enjoys them and knows that we’re by a good bakery on the way into the office.” Her voice still held a teasing note, but she curiously frowned at him.

He gave a casual shrug. “Yeah, but it’s a little extra motivation for him.”

“You’re lucky he likes us.”

“It’d be real awkward to be our S.O. otherwise.”

Natasha affectionately rolled her eyes while reaching to hold the back of Clint’s head. “You can promise Coulson doughnuts in the report you’re writing for last night.”

“Oh, I’m writing it?” he amusedly asked.

She leaned in for a kiss before murmuring, “I’ll add on a couple paragraphs when you’re done, but I just made the executive writing decision.”

“Mmm, it will keep me from having to do yard work.” Clint lightheartedly arched a brow. “Should I ask what you’re going to be doing?”

“Reading.” She started to lean back from him and snagged the tablet back, holding it up in his field of view. “We still have plenty of aerospace homework.”

“Right, the good stuff.” Clint winked. “But if you need a brain break, just let me know…”

“Try not to be too much of a distraction, Barton,” Natasha lightly said, unable to keep from smiling at him.

Clint innocently stretched so that his t-shirt slightly rode up, entirely catching her glance down to the exposed strip of skin. “I’ll see what I can do, but I make no promises, Romanoff,” he drawled with a wide grin.

She again rolled her eyes. “Let’s at least finish breakfast before you start seducing me.”

“But it is working,” he teased.

Natasha reached for his closest hand, linking her fingers through with his and slightly squeezing. “We’ll get to that later. Work first.”

“I will not be mentioning last night’s work break in our report.”

She smirked. “Good call.”

\--

Clint opened the front door to a beaming Bennie. “Hey, Francis!” he brightly began, “I know this is kinda last minute but I was wondering if you’d be interested in coming to go indoor scuba diving with me? My buddy ended up waking up sick today so I have an extra spot.” He held up a hand as he continued. “If you’d rather be spending the day with Natalie I totally understand, but I thought I’d offer the chance, seems like something adventurous you might be interested in.”

“How soon would you be leaving?”

“About twenty minutes at the latest?”

Clint nodded, angling back in the doorway to look towards the living room. “Hey, Nat?”

“Go be friendly!” she called back, Clint the only one to catch the audible smile in her voice.

He grinned at Bennie. “I’d be happy to join you. Anything special I need to grab first?”

Bennie shook his head. “They provide equipment, all we’ve got do is show up in comfortable clothes.”

“Just let me grab a few things and I’ll be right out.”

Bennie nodded and took a step back from the door. “No worries.”

Natasha had hopped up off the couch and followed Clint as he went to grab his wallet. “I’ll text you if Maria gets us anything time sensitive, but have fun.”

“Guess I can check this off the bucket list.” He met Natasha in a quick kiss before joking, “If I drown over there, just remember that I love you.”

She arched both eyebrows at him. “You’re not allowed to die in there. That’s an order.”

Clint couldn’t keep from grinning. “Yes ma’am.” He went for another kiss before starting to walk back to the front door. “I’ll let you know about when I should be back.”

“I love you, stay safe.”

He blew a kiss back to her with a wink before meeting Bennie outside.

Getting geared up was a fairly straightforward process at the diving place, and Bennie only got more and more excited as they got closer to actually diving in, complete with plenty of enthusiastic thumbs ups.

Clint had a little bit of scuba experience from one day back at the Academy to speed up the overview and safety briefings, and quickly realized that he had forgotten how fun the activity could be.

Bennie’s thumbs ups continued in the water as they swam around. However often he came to classes, he was evidently getting pretty good at scuba and seemed to be entirely comfortable in the water, navigating with ease.

When they had fully finished with the dive Bennie almost seemed to be physically vibrating with residual excitement. “Feel like anything to eat?”

“I do have an idea for a place, if you’re up to it,” Clint said with a small nod.

Bennie grinned. “I’m curious and feeling open to the unknown.”

Clint gave another nod. “Nothing wrong with Ethiopian food and some spice accordingly? I’ve stumbled across what sounds like a great family restaurant here not too far away.”

“I’ll do my best with the spices, but I won’t claim to always be great with them,” Bennie replied with a little laugh. “As long as it’s not going to upset my stomach with my tolerance levels.”

“Well, we’ll see what we can do.” Clint put a hand on Bennie’s shoulder and smiled as they headed out to the parking lot. “Broaden those horizons of yours.”

“Yeah, sometimes that is a struggle with the kids,” Bennie sighed before straightening. “Thanks for providing an easy opportunity though.”

“Just gotta take those chances, man.”

Getting to the restaurant was a relatively short drive and they were quickly settled at a table.

Bennie nervously laughed as he looked over the provided menu. “Any suggestions for what to try?”

“If you’re willing to try something a little spicier, go for the keiy wat, the milder option would be alicha wat or atkilt wat for one of the stews on the injera. That’s your flatbread base, and it’s a pretty representative meal.” Clint pointed at the menu’s provided pictures as he explained each item.

“Hmm, maybe that alicha wat then.” Bennie scanned the menu for a few extra moments before setting it down, curiously looking at Clint. “Do you think you’re going to miss it, all the traveling?”

He started with a casual shrug back. “It’s not like we’re permanently putting a stop to our travels, we’re just settling down a little more permanently. And the most important thing is spending time with Nat, whether we’re traveling or not. The job always comes second to that.”

Bennie just stared at him for a second before breaking into a beaming smile. “That’s a really beautiful thought, honestly.” He gave a little laugh. “Makes me remember that I should be doing more with Claire and not letting the kids or work interrupt that as often as I do.”

“Recognition is the first step,” Clint said, smiling while slightly raising his glass.

Ordering and getting their food took their conversation in a different direction before Bennie ended up bringing it back to Claire.

He paused for a moment, sitting with his mouth open and glancing down before speaking. “This might sound a little weird but, uh, I figure it can’t hurt for you to be aware of just in case if something does come up. I swear that Claire really likes you as neighbors, same as I do, but she’s been on the lookout lately for anything weird with you and Natalie. Sometimes she does just get hung up on little things and obviously I’m sure it’s nothing really, but just if something gets said or asked.”

“Good to know I guess, thanks.” Clint went for another bite of food before making a thoughtful sound. “Are you willing to at least try the spicy stuff?”

Bennie hesitated before nodding and leaning forward towards Clint’s proffered food. “Might as well, gotta take those chances.”

“That’s the spirit.” Clint watched with an involuntary grin as Bennie’s face screwed up and he started making a fanning motion at his mouth. “Yeah, don’t think that’s actually gonna help.”

“No,” Bennie tightly agreed, his eyes watering, “but maybe for placebo.” He quickly swallowed some of his drink before exhaling with a small huff. “Ooh, I am going to be feeling that later.”

\--

“It sounds like Claire’s suspicious about us,” Clint mentioned as he slipped in beside Natasha on the living room couch, simultaneously putting an arm around her shoulders.

“I’m not surprised.” With a few quick hand movements she pulled up several windows on the tablet in her lap before handing it to him. “She’s been busy googling us, according to what updates the techs sent us.”

He flipped through the windows, making an amused sound after several moments. “Huh, maybe I should have googled us too, they made us a nice website. And that photography?” He whistled. “If these are just a tech’s vacation pics I’m impressed.”

“The articles are pretty good too, at least someone’s got an alternate career in travel if they decide they’re done with SHIELD.” Natasha leaned her head over against his shoulder. “How’d it go with Bennie, besides you coming back all in one piece?”

Clint nodded. “I think it went great, really got some bonding in with the guy. He loves scuba, and I picked that Ethiopian place to eat afterwards, he seemed to really enjoy it and the food was great. We definitely need to make a visit together, see what you think of it too.”

“It’s a date.”

“And it’s kinda on the way to Aurora Corp, maybe a good choice for a pre-breaking in dinner if we need it?”

She affectionately rolled her eyes. “You make it sound as though we’re always so focused on the spycraft and espionage, and on this op especially of all the possibilities.”

“My favorite break ins are with you,” he innocently teased.

“You were better with the romance this morning, Barton.” Natasha didn’t bother to try to hide her smile.

He ducked down to press a quick kiss to her temple. “Hey, I love you too, Nat.” After a second he put the tablet down on the coffee table in front of them and angled a little closer to Natasha. “What are you thinking about Claire?”

“I’ve got an idea for how to handle her.”

“Should I ask?” Clint kept a lighthearted note in his voice.

Natasha brushed back a section of her hair with the back of her hand and pursed her lips at him. “It’s perfectly safe and friendly.”

“Mmm, just let me know if you want any back up.”

“We’ll see what happens.”


	4. Falling Into Place

Claire had happily accepted Natasha’s invitation to a self-defense seminar one of the city’s martial arts studios was holding, complete with the plan to follow it up with a visit to a fancy gelato place for a girls’ night out.

“It’s the type of thing I always thought would be useful to do, just in case, but never quite got around to so this is great,” Claire cheerily commented on the drive in, Natasha having offered to take them in her car for the better gas mileage.

Without taking her eyes off the road, Natasha nodded. “It’s good to have the skill.”

“Hopefully this isn’t a terrible question, but traveling around, is it something you’ve needed? Self-defense?” Claire’s expression went wistful. “I wanted to do some traveling back after high school but that was my mom’s main concern, something terrible happening to me that I couldn’t prevent.”

Natasha seemed to slightly measure her words as she responded. “They haven’t been the stereotypical travel fears, but I have had a few mostly travel unrelated encounters over the years that have necessitated some self-defense.”

Claire would have unconsciously leaned in closer were it not for her seatbelt. “Was it hard, in the moment?”

“I knew what I was doing and how to do it, but I would say that it definitely takes some practice to get yourself into a position to stay calm under the situational pressure.” As they stopped at a red light Natasha glanced over to Claire. “It’s why you practice in safe circumstances like tonight.”

“Did you feel like a badass?”

The light turned green as Natasha lightly laughed. “In practice or in doing it? The answer could be some of both.”

Claire grinned at her. “Seems like it’d be a good feeling.” She gave a laugh of her own. “I’m excited to find out.”

Her enthusiasm remained steady as they started the seminar, the instructors walking them through an overview of the evening’s plan and some basic strikes before instructing them to line up in pairs to practice the first exercise.

“Your call for who goes first,” Natasha prompted with a smile.

Claire loosely gestured for her to go on ahead. “Er, you’ve got more experience, I’ll see what you do and then go.” As per the exercise, she carefully grabbed Natasha’s wrist and solidly nodded. “Ready when you are.”

At a measured speed, Natasha squatted and leaned forward while bending her elbow towards Claire, twisting her forearm around until Claire had to let go of her wrist.

“Ready to try?”

Claire gave another nod. “I think so.” She waited for Natasha to grab her wrist before slowly walking through the same movements, breaking into something of a delighted smile as she forced Natasha to let go. “Can I try that again?”

“Of course.”

She slightly sped up the process and practiced another couple of times before the instructors introduced the next exercise and prompted them to stand directly in front of each other with their hands defensively raised to imitate it.

“Widen your stance,” Natasha suggested before slowly telegraphing her movements. She bent her arm at the elbow and shifted forward to aim her elbow towards Claire’s neck, careful not to actually make contact as Claire accordingly shifted away in mock response.

Again, Claire practiced a couple more times than Natasha before they adjusted to doing it with the other person standing behind them.

Claire gasped as she barely brushed Natasha’s cheek with her elbow on one back swing. “I am so sorry!”

“You’re fine,” Natasha immediately reassured, pointing up to her cheek for a second, “And we know you were aiming for a good spot.”

Claire nervously chuckled. “That’s something, I guess.”

She again happily let Natasha take the first go at the final exercise of escaping a bear hug, thankful for how well she telegraphed her movements while leaning forward, aiming an elbow back, and then twisting around to imitate a groin strike before separating.

It took Claire a couple hesitant tries to feel comfortable combining all the steps, with Natasha and one of the instructors coaching her through a couple repeats until she moved more confidently.

“I feel like a badass,” she told Natasha with a giddy grin.

The nearby instructor laughed. “We’ve got more classes you can look into, if you’re interested. Even some you can double up on with kids.”

Delight flashed through Claire’s eyes. “Do you have a brochure for that, or is the website better?”

With the relevant information obtained and a plan to talk about getting the kids involved in some judo classes, Claire and Natasha were the last seminar attendees to leave the studio.

Something of a giggle escaped Claire as she double checked the time on her phone. “How is it only 8:15? It feels like it should be later.”

“Too much later and we’d be cutting it close for the gelato,” Natasha amusedly said over her shoulder while fishing her keys out of her purse.

“Yeah,” Claire tossed her hair back while waiting by the passenger side for Natasha to unlock the car, “and that would be tragic.”

Natasha cast her a side smile as they settled into the car. “You seem to have enjoyed yourself in there.”

“I really did,” Claire happily sighed while buckling in. “And thank you so much for the suggestion and willingness to bring me along. It’s been… oh god, an embarrassingly long time since I’ve had a girls’ night out that didn’t double as waiting for the kids to finish with a movie or something. I needed this.”

“If you’d like, we could probably make a habit out of it.”

“That would be so nice, actually.” Claire smiled at Natasha. “I’m halfway curious to see if we can find something you haven’t done before.”

A corner of her mouth quirked up in a half smile. “You might be surprised at how easy that can be.”

“Okay, now I’m curious. Pottery class?”

“Once, a long time ago.”

“Glassblowing?”

“Never done it.” Natasha glanced over to Claire. “You?”

“No,” she said with a small shake of her head. “But it sounds interesting. I’ve heard a lot of good things about the local studio.”

“We’ll have to look into it for next time.”

“Next time,” Claire contently agreed. “And then we can check out the macarons at Emil’s bakery and you can tell me how authentic they actually are.”

\--

Bennie curiously stopped a couple steps into the living room as he got back from work the following night. “Oh god, did I forget a day?” he asked Claire after a blink to make sure he wasn’t imagining the scene.

Several LED candles were lit up on various surfaces through the living room with the rest of the room’s lights turned off, and Claire was holding two glasses of wine while dressed in a short silk robe.

She affectionately smiled while bringing him a wine glass and leaning up to press a kiss to his cheek. “Nope. There was just something Natalie said as we were talking last night about why she and Francis decided to get married and settle down that made me realize we’ve gotten slightly distracted from each other. And I think we should fix that, especially with the kids gone right now and leaving us with the whole house to ourselves…”

“Are we really having sex in the living room?”

“I mean…” She shrugged with both shoulders. “I don’t know, actually, but it seemed like a better place to at least literally start to mix things up from our routines.”

Bennie nodded and took a sip of his wine before gingerly setting it aside on the near end table and pulling Claire in at the waist into a kiss. “Well,” he hummed, “I am all for mixing it up if it means coming home from work to you in that.”

She tipped her head back as she laughed, prompting Bennie to press a soft kiss to the hollow of her neck. “Hold on just a second hon, it gets better.”

“You have my attention,” he teased while letting go of her waist.

After setting down her wine glass, Claire grinned and gently tugged on the front of his shirt to prompt him around the couch and onto a cushion before she winked and started slowly untying the robe, trying to be as sensual as possible. “And… I was thinking it might be really sexy if we – oup!”

She had tried to dramatically take a step forward while pulling out of the robe only to catch her foot on the edge of the rug and stumble forward into Bennie’s lap, bumping the coffee table in the process.

“You okay?” he worriedly asked while helping to right her, brushing back a section of her hair as Claire sat on the cushion beside him.

“That was not quite as sexy as I’d been hoping for,” she said with a little laugh.

He grinned and laughed back. “Maybe not, but that sounds about right for us trying something new the first time.” His hands slid down her arms to help guide the last of the robe off and fully reveal the lingerie set she was wearing underneath. “You still look hot, babe.”

“Aww, Bennie.” She put her hands on his shoulders and leaned up into another kiss before starting to undo the buttons of his shirt. “I love you.”

“Mmm, I love you too.”

They both jointly worked off his shirt before Claire purposefully started to climb into his lap, giggling and instinctively stretching out after a second as Bennie settled his hands on her hips, idly running one thumb across a section of her stomach.

“Still tickli- oh shoot.” The sound of shattering glass interrupted her statement and she moved off of Bennie with a regretful sigh.

“The Barton’s gift?” he guessed while leaning forward to see the damage on the other side of the coffee table.

“I think we can at least salvage what’s inside?” Claire frowned for a second at the scattered remains of the vase. “If we empty out the flower vase and get the dustpan, I think that should work?”

Bennie nodded and got up from the couch to head for the kitchen closet. “Do you want gloves for the glass?”

“They look like big enough shards, I think we’ll be fine,” she called after him before kneeling down and starting to sort through the glass and larger rocks.

A few seconds later Bennie came back with the dustpan, brush, and empty flower vase. “Okay, there’s that… Claire?”

She was staring in confusion at an object in her hand and held it up for Bennie to look at. “That’s not a rock.”

“No,” he agreed with a frown, leaning in closer to get a better look at the object. “That almost looks… electronic. Maybe with a speaker?”

Claire sharply inhaled. “Oh my god.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “What if it’s a bug? Bennie, what if they’re _spying_ on us?”

“Why would they be spies?” he whispered back.

“Francis mentioned that Natalie is Russian! You work for an aerospace and defense company, babe! And this,” she gestured the object around while continuing to whisper, “is probably a bug! They’re spying on us! It’s just like _The Americans_!”

He knit his brow together. “That’s… possible.” He reached to take the bug from Claire. “We should probably stick this in a secure spot, bring it to James and he can tell us whether it’s legit.”

She nodded. “Okay.” After a second her eyes lit up in what Bennie had long ago meant she had a definite idea. “Bennie, the Bartons are out of the house for a date night and we still have the garage remote from when the Millers had us dogsit-.”

“No, Claire,” he groaned, “we’re not breaking into our neighbor’s house.”

“They might be spies!” she hissed. “There could be evidence in the house!”

“Claire-.”

“We should at least get an idea what we’re asking about before bringing that to James.”

Bennie paused for a second, looking at Claire before nodding. “Do you know how much longer they should be gone?”

“They went to Benvolio’s, I think? At least half an hour drive, with a late dinner and probably doing dessert too… they’ll be a bit.”

“Okay.” He reached for his shirt and started to button it back on. “We’ll go check out the house for fifteen minutes at max and then we are coming right back and contacting James to meet us first thing in the morning.”

Claire used the coffee table to help stand back up. “Okay, just let me grab some actual clothes and we’re going.”

They hurried towards the house, cringing at the creak of the garage door and checking over their shoulders for anyone looking out their windows at the sound or otherwise watching them.

Bennie kept his eyes glued to the end of the street in case of any headlights. “I’m starting to think this was a bad plan,” he whispered to Claire over his shoulder.

An annoyed sigh escaped her. “You know, hon, it hurts my feelings when you’re not supportive. And you said fifteen minutes.”

“We are literally breaking into someone’s house, I’m having concerned second thoughts!”

She wrapped her arm around his and started to pull him back. “So we shouldn’t stand right in the middle of the driveway!”

“Don’t touch anything by hand, we don’t want to leave fingerprints,” Bennie solemnly whispered as they snuck through the garage.

Claire wrapped a hand through her shirt before prompting the garage door to shut and opening the door to the house.

They both expectantly tensed and paused for a second before relaxing and creeping further into the house.

“It’s all very… new-ish,” she noted as they walked past the laundry room and a side bathroom towards the kitchen. “It fits with being newlyweds, but…”

“We’ll check upstairs.” He let out a relieved breath as they carefully started to check a room with several monitors and a high-backed chair. “Okay, they’re serious gamers. Maybe it’s just a gamer thing, some sort of real life adventure thing that they’re inviting us to-.”

“Wait.” Claire picked up a tablet from the desktop, tapping on the surface. “No one keeps tablets in their gaming room.”

“Fingerprints!” Bennie hissed with slight panic.

“It’s got a code anyhow.” She carefully set the tablet down in as close to its original position as possible.

He tried nudging the computer mouse, using his hand through a chunk of his shirt. “They’re older – oh.”

Claire squeezed in beside him to look at the awoken monitors with an increased frown. “Is that…?”

“Aurora Corp building details? Apparently.” Bennie clicked on a separate tab, his eyes immediately widening. “Kevin, Susan, security camera footage? What the hell are they doing?”

Claire gasped and pointed to another corner of the screen. “Oh my god, they have a file on you!” She whirled to face him, eyes frantic. “They’re actual Russian spies!”

“We need to find something else to bring James to help confirm it,” he said while holding both hands out before starting to look around the room. “Something small that they’re not going to miss but that would belong to spies.”

“Here, see if this has any hidden buttons or anything.” Claire had picked up a small, almost arrowhead like object from the table behind the monitors. “Otherwise, I don’t know, maybe there’s some more bugs? Maybe we need to go to their bedroom?”

“That seems a little – shit!” Bennie dropped the object as Claire picked up a small disk and immediately stiffened with a surprised sound, starting to collapse a second later. “Claire, Claire!” He helped to steady her, not at all comforted by the way she was limp against him. “Claire!”

After another second she made a small noise that at least reassured him she hadn’t suddenly died. “Ow…”

“Okay, we’re going home.” He shifted Claire to supportively hold her up under one side and started guiding her out of the room and for the stairs. “This is too much, babe, we need to call the police or the FBI or something.”

He effectively had to half drag, half carry her down the stairs before she attempted a stumbling step with him. “Bennie?” Her voice almost came out slurred.

“Claire?” He made no effort to hide any of his worry.

“W… what happened?”

“I think you got shocked, maybe?”

“Oh?” She started to turn to look back. “Shouldn’t we grab it?”

“No, bad idea. We need to just leave.” He steered Claire around as they made their way back towards the garage as quickly as she could apparently move. “We’re in over our heads.”

She frowned and tried to stop him. “We need evidence.”

“We’ll get help and then evidence.” Bennie sharply inhaled. “And I need to let James know first thing in the morning so he can beef up Aurora security.” He didn’t bother waiting for the garage door to be all the way up before starting to lead Claire through. “And tonight we- oh no.”

Claire followed his line of sight down the street where the headlights of a car had appeared. “The Bartons?”

“We need to move!” he insistently whispered, pulling her more firmly back towards their house. “Where’s the garage remote?”

She started to fish it out of her right back pocket, helped by Bennie pulling it out with her and aiming it to signal the door to close.

At the decorative bush at the edge of their front yard, Bennie prompted Claire to lay on the ground beside it with him.

“What are we doing?” she whispered, starting to push herself back up on arms that were still slightly unsteady.

“Not letting them see us,” he whispered back, trying to look for the car through the mass of the bush.

They waited behind the bush as the car pulled up into the Barton’s driveway and garage, accompanied by the nervous sound of their breathing until they were certain Clint and Natasha weren’t coming outside after them.

Neither of them still opted to say anything more until they had quietly crept back into their house, Claire waiting until Bennie had fully closed the door. “I can’t believe that our neighbors are actually spies! And I really liked them!”

“I’m going to message James, and he’ll be able to tell us whether we should go to the police or FBI first. We just have to wait until tomorrow morning, and we’ll figure this out.”

“That sounds good.” Claire nodded. “I’m just… oh my god, our neighbors are spies.”


	5. All in a Day's Work

“Of course it’s the neighbors that throw things off,” Clint sighed as he readied several arrowheads in the passenger seat of Natasha’s car.

After finding the dropped arrowhead in their equipment room, it hadn’t taken much guesswork for Clint and Natasha to figure to double check what their bug in the Pollack house had picked up on earlier in the night.

Before they could try to directly talk to Bennie and Claire they had left early in the morning, prompting Clint and Natasha to follow at a distance. They didn’t expect anything to go wrong with them, but in light of some of their Aurora Corp surveillance figured it couldn’t hurt to see just who and where Bennie and Claire were running to.

Spotting a sniper positioned for taking out the security officer Bennie and Claire were talking to was a definite snag in events.

Hence Natasha hurriedly driving Clint into a better position to hopefully take out the sniper before the security officer.

She didn’t need to look to figure that his sudden “Shit!” meant that the security officer was dead.

“Tell me they’re taking cover!” she exclaimed while sharpening the turn.

“Looks like it!” Clint carefully pushed himself halfway out the passenger window and drew back for a shot at the sniper, knocking them down with a shock arrow to the chest. “They’re behind their car,” he added on, scanning the area for any additional threats.

Natasha glanced in the rearview mirror and frowned. “Company’s coming!” she told Clint before bringing them to a stop by where Bennie and Claire were protectively crouching together.

Bennie protectively angled over Claire as they both looked up at the car. “What the hell is happening?” he asked, panic clearly tinging his voice.

“We need you to get in the car-,” Natasha started, interrupted by an also panicked Claire.

“We just found out your spies, why should we trust you?”

A bullet cracked one of the far windows on the Pollack car.

“Get in the car and we will mostly explain everything!” Clint firmly ordered without taking his eyes off the approaching car, keeping an arrow nocked and aimed. “Also we don’t want you dead!”

With a split-second shared look, Bennie and Claire rushed into the backseat of Natasha’s car, tightly holding to each other as they nervously settled in.

“Duck down, don’t make yourselves easy to hit,” she suggested before stepping on the gas.

Clint had angled to shoot behind them, waiting for Natasha to accelerate before sending an arrow flying right for the hand of the person trying to shoot at them from the passenger side of the approaching car. It exploded into a sticky substance across their hand and caused their shot to go wide as they fumbled their gun.

A second later another person leaned out from the car and started firing just as a couple others on motorcycles appeared from the intersection they crossed, halfway prompting Clint to duck back inside the vehicle.

When a bullet thunked off the rear windshield Claire shakily exhaled and somehow squeezed Bennie’s hand tighter than she had been clutching it. “Are you the good guys or the bad guys?” she managed to yell.

“I dunno, I think the bad guys might be the people in black and shooting at us!” Clint yelled back with a note of sarcasm, pulling out another arrow.

Cutting off any response from Bennie or Claire, Natasha hurriedly asked Clint, “Left or right?”

“Left, slow as you can give me.”

As Natasha took the turn he fired towards the engine of the approaching car, sending it alight in an explosion a moment after contact.

One of the motorcyclists was thrown from their bike in the explosion, the other accelerated to try and follow them around the corner.

Clint leaned back into the car. “Nat-.”

“I see them.”

“Do we want them alive?”

At the question Bennie and Claire snapped their heads up. “You’re going to kill them?”

Clint gave an annoyed exhale. “They are currently trying to kill us, so maybe. Nat?”

“We should have the sniper, but your call.”

“Copy that.” He shifted back to his position braced in the window while pulling out an arrow, barely needing a moment to aim to punch through the motorcyclist’s front tire.

The rider went flying with a small startled sound, awkwardly catching themselves in an attempted roll against the pavement.

“They’re staying down,” Natasha told Clint as he again ducked back into sitting in the passenger seat.

He nodded and rolled his window back up, setting his bow on the dash before twisting around to look at Bennie and Claire. “Okay, we’re going to get to a safe location and then we’ll talk, but you can sit up now.”

They slowly straightened in their seats, eyes still wide.

Claire swallowed before exchanging a nervous glance with Bennie. “And how are we supposed to know that we can even trust you?” She tried to sound as brave as possible but couldn’t help the quaver in her voice.

“Not really up to us, but right now I’d go with we’re not the ones trying to kill you.”

“And, uh, thank you, obviously,” Bennie interjected, “but this is… a lot.”

“And what does mostly explain even mean?” Claire’s voice had somewhat steadied as she spoke.

“That we can’t tell you everything, but that we don’t plan to leave you in the dark.” 

Natasha briefly glanced back while taking a slower turn. “You do need to promise us that you’re not going straight to the police, otherwise this could get slightly complicated.”

Panic fully returned to Claire and Bennie’s expressions. “Otherwise you’ll kill us too?” she fearfully asked.

“We don’t want to kill you,” Clint and Natasha said at the same time.

“We do like you,” he added on. “Despite breaking into our house.”

Bennie and Claire’s cheeks immediately flushed several shades. “And you bugged our house,” she quickly managed to say, “what sort of neighbors does that make you?”

Natasha cast Clint a faintly amused side look.

He nodded at Bennie and Claire. “Fair enough, we’re not picture perfect neighbors. Can we at least get you breakfast?”

\--

Deciding on a diner had been easy, and they managed to hold off on actually discussing business until after all the food had arrived.

Bennie cleared his throat, keeping his voice quiet. “So, uh, you’re spying on Aurora Corp and bugged our house…”

“Our organization got credible intel about someone within the R&D department sending items to a group of international concern. You were an easy to access suspect.”

Claire raised an eyebrow. “Who do you even work for?”

“That’s confidential,” Natasha smoothly said, leaning back a little in the booth.

“You mentioned international, do you work for an international agency?” Bennie asked.

“Still confidential.”

“Was I just a suspect because I work in R&D?”

Clint and Natasha subtly exchanged a look before she replied, carefully measuring her words. “Your background fit with what would be required knowledge from what we intercepted.”

Claire quickly swallowed a bite of pancake. “And we were easy to access? Did you make the Howards move? They did get a new job offer surprisingly quick.”

“We were just briefed on our part of the mission, we don’t know anything about if there was any specific involvement before us,” Clint said with a casual shrug.

“Do you really like us or were you just pretending to get closer to company info?” Bennie asked, taking a glance between Clint and Natasha as he sipped at his coffee.

“We genuinely like you.” Natasha warmly smiled. “It’s been… nice, getting to know you and doing things together. We don’t get a lot of that, in our line of work.”

“And we got to company info without you easily enough,” Clint said, ignoring the way Natasha bumped his knee in warning under the table.

Bennie finished another sip. “How did you get into, er, spying?”

“That’s confidential.”

“Do you have people that clean up all the bullets and, uh, people from a shootout like that?”

Clint made a small point of looking away while Natasha innocently shrugged.

Claire gave a little sigh. “Can we try asking other important questions until we get to something that isn’t confidential or something you otherwise can’t tell us?”

Clint and Natasha jointly nodded.

“Are your names really Natalie and Francis?”

“Not quite.”

“Are you really the Bartons?”

“Confidential.”

“Are you technically spies or secret agents?” Claire made a slightly excited sound. “Both?”

“We’re not at liberty to say.”

“Did you make up your travel stories?”

“Some of them are true.”

“Are you actually even married?”

“Not quite.”

“Do you actually like each other or was all that just pretend?”

Clint couldn’t help breaking into a grin and squeezed Natasha’s hand under the table. “It’s a little bit more serious than just liking each other.”

“Don’t say too much of everything,” she murmured to him, letting a lighthearted note through.

Bennie made a thoughtful sound after a second. “Can I ask what was the point of the bug in the house if the concern was at work?”

“Thoroughness.”

“And what you found out, does that have to do anything with this morning?” Bennie blinked, his breath suddenly hitching. “Oh god, James is dead. I got so distracted with everything I wasn’t even thinking…”

Claire leaned in against Bennie and ran a hand down his back. “Baby, it’s…”

Natasha leaned back and crossed her arms. “We know this isn’t going to be easy, but if you listen to us and go home, fall back into your usual routine, and you shouldn’t be in any more danger than you already accidentally put yourselves in.”

“Are you sticking around in the neighborhood?” Bennie asked, a subtly hopeful note in his eyes.

She nodded. “Until we resolve the situation.”

Clint shrugged with one shoulder. “No need to get into the details of it but settling down isn’t actually realistic for us. Nothing personal, we just don’t do suburbia.” He ignored another knee bump from Natasha.

“If you, uh, need any internal help at Aurora Corp-.”

“Thanks, Bennie, really, but we’ve got investigation covered. And you saw a piece of the risk of what you’d be involving yourself in. You’ve got a family to think about, man.”

“He’s not wrong,” Claire quietly murmured to Bennie, linking her fingers through his. “This is… a lot.”

Natasha unfolded her arms to brush a section of hair behind her ear with the back of her hand. “All the more reason to go home, start to process.” She paused for a half second before adding on. “I’d consider some therapy.”

“Yeah,” Claire heavily sighed, “that’d probably be good.”

\--

After dropping Claire and Bennie off at the house and making as much of a point as possible in reminding them to stick to their normal routine, Clint and Natasha were all too happy to be back at their house for a bit.

“The resulting paperwork mountain from this morning is going to be the worst version of fun,” Clint complained across the threshold. He pulled out his phone to check and frowned, holding it over to Natasha. “First report from what backup got from the sniper and motorcyclist while we were busy. Techs got us an ID too.”

She questioningly arched a brow and also frowned as she read the message on the screen. “That could present a problem.”

“What do you think are the odds of getting recognized if we go in?”

“Too high to risk it.” Natasha pursed her lips and sighed. “We need an Aurora employee in case if they check the database, we already have an in…”

“But it’s a different kind of risk,” Clint finished, his voice soft as he reached to pull Natasha towards him. “We don’t have to-.”

“No.” She shook her head. “We’ve got this chance to actually get some of their leadership at this and we have backup right at hand today. All we have to do is do our jobs and they’ll be fine. It’s worth it.”

He hugged her closer and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “STRIKE Team Delta, we’ve got this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No fic based off this movie could be complete without a bit of a chase sequence and some stereotypical lines :)


	6. First Time on the Job

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Incorporating one of my other favorite broad storyline aspects of "Keeping Up With the Joneses" in this chapter!

“Which do you think, blue tie with stripes or green with the white dots?” Bennie held up the corresponding ties by his neck as he asked.

“Mmm, I like the blue better.” Claire shook her head as she finished putting in the last of her curls and gestured down her body. “Gold or silver with this?”

“Gold, and the five-year anniversary necklace looks good with that dress specifically.” Bennie lovingly smiled at Claire. “Plus those drop earrings from your mom with the same color of stones?”

She smiled back. “Thanks hon.”

“Hey Pollacks, we don’t have all night and it’s not prom,” Clint loudly called from outside the master bathroom.

“Just a second, we don’t get out like this much!” Claire called back.

In a much safer way, the afternoon had been no less adventurous than the morning. She and Bennie had just been starting to relax back into a semblance of a normal weekend when Clint and Natasha knocked on their door. They had briefly explained that Kevin was the Aurora Corp mole and that he had arranged a meeting with the “group of international concern” without identifying himself before asking if they would be willing to act in Kevin’s place for the meeting.

Discussing it had been an admittedly easy decision for Bennie and Claire. They couldn’t necessarily pin down why they were so eager to get involved so quickly, especially in light of what had happened to James earlier, but it helped to have the reassurance that Clint and Natasha and a whole team of their people had their back.

And it was exciting to play a part in actual spy work.

The overall plan was simple: attend the charity function Kevin had arranged the meeting at. Meet the contacts who were going to buy what were apparently some sort of top secret level plans off of them and casually follow them out of the entirely public sphere. Clint, Natasha, and their team would then move in and take the contacts. Bennie and Claire could be back at their house by ten at the latest.

They stepped out of the bathroom and Clint handed them an earpiece each. “These are always gonna be on, so you don’t need to worry about reaching up to touch your ear to activate them or anything. Just maybe don’t stand where the contacts can easily see your ears, keep it conspicuous.”

Natasha stepped in front of him to tuck tiny microphones onto the inside of Bennie’s collar and Claire’s dress. “Don’t touch these either,” she said while fitting them, “and speak at a normal volume. We will be able to hear you loud and clear, and we need to hear what’s happening in the background too.”

“Right.” Claire nodded with an exhale. “Just act casual. Easy.”

“We’ll be monitoring you the entire time,” Clint reminded. “Nothing to worry about.”

Bennie nervously tugged on the front of his suit jacket. “Where’s the briefcase?”

It almost seemed like Natasha and Clint shared an amused look before she picked the briefcase up from the nearby dresser and handed it to him. “Do we need to lock it to your wrist?” she drily asked, arching an eyebrow at Bennie.

His face went red and he tightened his grip on the handle. “Uh, no, thanks, I’ve got it. I promise.”

Claire slipped her arm through his available one. “What’s the time?”

“Let’s get you going.”

\--

“This feels like a movie,” Claire whispered to Bennie as they walked up to the building before chuckling. “Does that mean we need to get out more often?”

“I think it’s the secret mission and all the glittering lights,” he whispered back with an amused smile.

“But we should probably still get out more often.”

He patted her arm. “Claire, you know I love you, but maybe worry about that after we get past the potentially dangerous part.”

“Eyes on target, Pollacks.” Clint almost sounded like there was a subtle note of teasing in his voice.

They cleared their throats and continued walking up to the building, presenting their tickets and starting to wander through the art gallery inside.

Bennie kept a tight grip on the briefcase, continuously glancing between the surroundings and the art until Claire gently bumped his side with her elbow. “They’ll find us,” she murmured, “just act casual and tell me whether you think that’s supposed to be a lion or just some smudged blobs.”

“Mmm, I think those are eyes but I’m not actually sure.” He tilted his head to the side for a different angle. “That might be the tail?”

“Oh, I do really like this flower scene down here, reminds me of that other piece in Sarah’s room.” Claire pointed and tugged Bennie along with her past a few other pieces. “And it’s still low enough that a bid wouldn’t be out of our budget... Birthday gift?”

He nodded. “It can’t hurt to try.”

Natasha interrupted on the comms. “Finish shopping, looks like you’ve been spotted.” Before Bennie and Claire could start to glance around she firmly added on, “Don’t look, write down your bid and keep on browsing before they make contact.”

Claire hoped she wasn’t too obviously stiff as she wrote down a suitable bid and basic contact details on the flower painting’s bidding sheet.

She and Bennie were just starting to move on towards looking over another painting when a man in a well fitted suit approached them from behind. “There are certainly some talented locals, wouldn’t you agree?”

“A lot of good art,” Bennie said with a nod and a small smile.

The man’s expression didn’t change while pointedly glancing down at the briefcase for a second. “Would you like to see Ricard’s private collection?”

Claire figured it’d be better to leave Bennie with the rest of the code signal, in keeping with their pretending to be Kevin and his wife.

“Will there be champagne?”

The man curtly nodded and gestured them aside with one hand. “This way, please.”

“All very cloak and daggers,” Claire murmured, split between light amusement and awkward nervousness. She quickly cleared her throat as the man flatly stared at her for a second before they continued on.

There was no comment from Clint or Natasha.

Hopefully that was a good sign.

Bennie slightly loosened his grip on the briefcase as he realized he was clutching at the handle tighter than was comfortable. “Is there anything you need before-?”

“Everything in the briefcase?” the man asked without looking back.

“Yes-.”

“Then just wait until we get to the meeting.”

Claire and Bennie exchanged a raised eyebrow look and little shrugs while they followed the man down a hallway towards a far corner of the building.

They couldn’t help but nervously swallow upon seeing the two armed guards outside the double doors the man brought them to.

One of the guards asked something in a language they couldn’t identify, and the man chuckled before the guard opened the door and gestured them through.

“Ah, and there they are.” A man rose with open arms and a polite smile from one couch. “Just in time.” He gestured towards the couch across from him. “Please, take a seat.”

Claire was 90% certain he had a subtle Russian accent, but she would be among the first to admit she also had a little too much dramatic TV accent to base off of and that her judgement could be slightly skewed.

She and Bennie came around to obligingly sit on the offered couch, noting a few more armed guards hovering around the room in various positions and the other main man sitting beside the one who had risen to greet them.

He shifted the briefcase into his lap, clearing his throat for a second. “So what comes first here?”

A corner of the man’s mouth momentarily quirked up in a smirk as he settled back into his seat. “Show us that you’ve brought everything we asked of you to begin.”

“Right.” Bennie exhaled and nodded to himself before opening the latches on the briefcase and twisting it around to show the man the contents. “It’s all on the drives and you’ve got the charging cell prototype right there.”

“And what about the plans for the cell adapter?”

“They should be on the drive-.”

“Should be?” the man sharply asked, eyes suddenly narrowed.

Claire shifted slightly back in her seat, nervously glancing between Bennie and the man.

“It-.” Bennie stopped as the man again interrupted him.

“No cell adapter was ever mentioned in our messages, and you can surely see how it seems highly suspicious that you would forget that, no?”

Bennie stared at the man for a second before replying. “There were a lot of plans.”

“Or rather you are not the so-called ‘TerranCyclops’ we were interacting with.” The man held up two fingers and gestured towards Bennie and Claire, prompting the guards to start to circle in around them. “And in that case… who are you working with?


	7. Minor Complications

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which a few more liberties with MCU-based canon are taken :)

“Shit,” Clint hissed to himself before opening up the comm channel to the SHIELD team. “Decoys have been made and need immediate extraction, do you copy? Two from up top, two from the bottom-.”

“Agent Barton,” the team leader interrupted, “we’ve been given orders not to engage. It’s too public and we can’t afford to make this a scene right now.”

Natasha and Clint exchanged a deep frown while simultaneously hurrying for their access point.

“We reassured them they would be fine, we’re not making them collateral-.”

“This came from my supervising officer, Agent Barton, and I’m obligated to obey those direct orders.”

“They are directly based under Reuter,” Natasha darkly commented just to Clint.

He nodded and grit his teeth. “Why do we always get the ‘don’t tell me the odds’ situations?”

“Because we’re STRIKE Team Delta.” She managed to sound faintly amused while also looking deadly serious as they ran. After a half second she turned on the comms to add on, “Pollacks, we’re coming. Don’t worry.”

They were still hearing Claire and Bennie thankfully trying to maintain cover and rolling with the situation as well as they could while definitely starting to panic.

Clint snapped out his bow as they approached the room. “Take the Glasgow approach?”

Natasha curtly nodded. “Do you want left or right?”

“I’ll take left.”

They rounded the corner and both immediately took down their respective door guard, Clint firing off a shock arrow and Natasha a Widow’s Bite.

He counted down from three on one hand before pushing the door open for her.

Natasha stalked through with a Glock at the ready, her expression dark.

The internal armed guards immediately pulled Claire and Bennie back by an arm each, angling them towards the door. One guard aimed at Natasha, the other aimed at Bennie’s side.

She barely glanced at the guards, instead arching an eyebrow at the main men behind them who couldn’t help but stare at her with slightly widened eyes. “What, you weren’t expecting a familiar face?” she wryly asked in Russian.

“The Black Widow in the flesh.” Something that might have been awe tinged the man’s voice. “You are a surprise.”

Clint held an arrow towards the guards with Claire and Bennie as he stepped in behind Natasha, quickly scanning over everyone in the room without shifting his stance.

Besides the two main men and the guards, three other armed individuals in the room and all directly focused on him and Natasha. It wasn’t going to be their easiest situation to tackle, but they’d certainly faced worse odds.

Although they never had had decoy civilians in the mix before. That could be a problem.

One of the main men held up the briefcase. “Are you here for this?” He jerked his head in a nod towards Bennie and Claire. “Or them?”

Natasha continued to look at them with even regard. “Does it make a difference?”

The man who wasn’t holding the briefcase shrugged while extending his hands slightly from his side. “I think that depends on you.”

In the background, the team leader was trying to get Clint and Natasha to give a verbal response for confirming their current position.

Clint interrupted in less fluent Russian. “Or you could just stand down, make this nice and easy for us.”

All the guards and the main men exchanged small glances before breaking into short chuckles, not all helping Bennie and Claire ease from being any less obviously worried.

“Easy for you?” The same man who had shrugged openly gestured around the room, sharply smiling at Clint. “You are in no place to threaten, alone and outnumbered.” He focused back to Natasha. “Where did you find such an associate, Widow?”

She almost smiled at the question. “You know I’ve singlehandedly taken on more men than this and walked away.”

“Ah, but you are not singlehanded here.”

The man with the case held it up. “You value what’s in this. And them.”

“Okay Mr. Comic Book Villain, we get it,” Clint muttered to himself, narrowly resisting the urge to roll his eyes. Best to at least try to keep as serious a face forward under the circumstances.

Without any adjustment in her stance Natasha looked at Bennie and Claire, directly catching her eye and switching back to English. “We practiced for situations like this.”

After a second understanding dawned across Claire’s expression and she instinctively started to nod back at Natasha.

Clint only needed Natasha inclining her head towards Bennie as prompting to shoot at the guard who held him, an arrow lodging into the furthest eye socket.

Before the guard could even finish their first pained exclamation and start to reel back, Natasha had thrown a flash bomb and smoke disk to land behind him.

Claire twisted her forearm out of her guard’s grip as quickly as she dared, jumping at the flash of light and subsequent smoke that started billowing up while also quickly grabbing Bennie’s hand and yanking him towards Clint and Natasha.

He fired at the nearest approaching guard before pulling Claire and Bennie into a crouch, Natasha also taking a couple shots before ducking out of the other guard’s access in the doorway.

“Keep your head down out to the hallway,” Clint warned, crouching with them for a second to make sure they were staying low and moving before looking at Natasha. “They’re running?”

She nodded at him without looking, shifting around the doorway to shoot a guard in the chest who was coming towards them. “Back exit, one guard with them.”

“You wanna follow or Plan D?” His question was punctuated by a groan from the guard with an arrow in the eye.

Natasha paused before starting to step back into the hallway. “Plan D’s the better option right now.”

With none of the guards moving to attack them, Clint and Natasha put away their weapons while joining Bennie and Claire in the hallway and helping them back to their feet.

“They have the plans! What do we do? That wasn’t in the plan!” Bennie blurted in a panic.

Claire showed equal concern, her eyes still wide. “That’s bad, right? They-.”

“We’re spies, we have a backup plan,” Natasha said, almost breaking into a smirk as she pulled a small remote out of a belt pocket and clicked it.

Bennie and Claire both watched the remote expectantly for a second until Natasha slipped it back into her pocket.

“That’s it?” Bennie asked.

“That’s it for the two of you,” Clint pointedly said.

No need to mention that they had set up the drives to fry and a hopeful putty eruption from the case. If it worked well enough for keeping whoever held the case stuck to it, that was definitely going into an arrow concept later.

Natasha paused at the sound of the team leader again trying to contact them over the comms. “Agent Barton, Agent Romanoff, what the hell just happened in there?”

She activated her end. “We secured the situation, keep on the back exit. Expect two actives, one partially restrained. We’ll follow up after removing the decoys.”

A moment of silence passed from the team leader. “Copy that.”

Clint and Natasha exchanged a silent communicative look before starting to walk down the hallway, prompting Bennie and Claire with them. 

“Time to get you back home,” Clint brightly remarked.

“Are you going to stick around for a bit after you wrap this up, or is it straight off to the next mission for you?” Claire asked after a few seconds as they walked, a definite hopeful note to her voice.

“Wrapping this up won’t be done until we leave, and we can only do undercover for so long.”

“Can we find out your real names?” Bennie asked.

Clint chuckled. “Sorry, but that’s honestly information that could put you in danger with the wrong people.”

“Is the Barton part real at all?”

Natasha smirked and looked over her shoulder at Clint as they walked, her smirk widening as he grinned at her. “That’s confidential.”

Bennie and Claire jointly groaned.

\--

Clint carefully refolded his newspaper and set it down beside him on the park bench. “I thought these guys were supposed to be on time.”

“Mmm.” Natasha flipped a page in her book beside him. “Five more minutes and something went wrong.”

They were and supposed to be meeting a couple of supposed Red Room scientists who were interested in defecting, planning to confirm the legitimacy of the claim before SHIELD made an offer.

And they never minded a chance to utilize the Prague safehouse.

Beneath his sunglasses, Clint surreptitiously scanned the nearby paths. “At least that’d be- oh,” he gave a small chuckle, “you’ve gotta be kidding me.”

Natasha glanced up, following his gaze. Arching a brow, she settled for a simple, “Oh.”

“Maybe they won’t – dammit.”

Bennie and Claire had broken into excited smiles and started to wave as soon as they realized they had Clint and Natasha’s attention.

“Natalie! Francis!” Claire eagerly greeted as they walked over. “Oh my god, it’s so great to see you!”

“Keep an eye to the left,” Natasha quickly told Clint beneath her breath before smiling back at Claire and Bennie, standing to meet them. “Prague’s a long way from home for you.”

Claire and Bennie jointly shrugged. “We thought we might as well make our first big trip include as many countries as we could reasonably fit. Our next main stop is gonna be in Budapest.”

Clint couldn’t help a grin. “Budapest is lovely this time of year. If you want, we can definitely give you some of the hidden must-dos.”

“That’d be great, actually,” Bennie said with a nod.

Movement from the left instinctively caught both Clint and Natasha’s attention, and Claire started to turn to look. “Oh, are you-?”

Natasha stopped her by firmly grabbing her shoulder, maintaining a smile even as her eyes grew serious. “Just let us handle this and we can catch up over dinner after.”

“Think it’s just two,” Clint quietly added. “It’s almost like they’re not even trying.”

Bennie blinked. “Uh…”

Natasha withdrew her hand from Claire’s shoulder and started to reach for her hidden Glock. “We’ll be five minutes at most, decide what you want to eat.” Her gaze flickered back to the left. “And duck when I tell you to.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap! Hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing this!


End file.
